The Danish company Tajco, which makes tailpipes for cars, has branches in six countries and recently celebrated its 75th anniversary. Simultaneously with the celebration in Denmark, the anniversary was also marked in China, the USA, Germany, Slovakia, and Japan, where Tajco also has branches.
Tajco’s production takes place at the company’s factory in China, where there are about 800 employees. Every year, around eight million stainless steel pipe tails are produced there, which are chrome-plated. Among Tajco’s customers are well-known car manufacturers such as BMW, Audi, Volvo, Ford, Porsche, VW, and Bentley.
Frank Lorenz, director, and co-owner of the company says to local media JydskeVestkysten that they have tried to make the anniversary festive while complying with current corona restrictions.
According to communications manager Thomas Nielsen, the reception was held at different times according to the different time zones and he explained that in China, they are a few hours ahead of Danish time, so they held their reception at the same time as the reception was held in Denmark. It has been a puzzle logistically to celebrate the anniversary everywhere, but we have succeeded, he says.
Among other things, he has also had to make local adjustments concerning the gifts that employees receive. “The anniversary is celebrated with a double meal for the employees, who also receive a gift in the form of a retro sports bag with the company logo as well as a book and some bottles of wine. In China, however, wine is not a particularly popular gift, so there it has been replaced with a power bank. They would rather receive that, Thomas Nielsen says. The company’s around 1000 employees also received a book about the company’s history. Thomas Nielsen is the author of the book and says that it’s been published in Danish, English, and Chinese.
In connection with the anniversary, the company also held an internal fitness challenge competition, where the employees competed against each other in who would take most steps during 8 to 28 March and the Chinese employees went to great lengths to win. “The initiative has been well received in all departments. We had hoped for 200 participants but came up with 225 participants divided into 45 teams with five participants. Our original hope was that each team would reach 75 kilometers of running per week. We have a team at the factory in China who have surprised us by having covered an overwhelming number of kilometers. During the first week, the five men on the team reached 999.5 kilometers and in the second week they were up to almost 1900 kilometers. The winning team was a team from the factory in China who ended up covering 3013 kilometers in the 22 days,” Thomas Nielsen says.
In addition to the prizes for the individual participating teams, the company’s internal fitness challenge triggers a donation per kilometer to an organization that plants trees in Ethiopia.
